We Need a Cure for Quick Fixism
Why is it that people expect you to fix in minutes what took them days, weeks, months, or years to break? I often find myself initially feeling hopeless about a person’s willingness, or lack thereof, to work on the areas of their life that put them in the position in which they find themselves. I often rhetorically ask, “Why am I doing this?” While if I was on the bus pictured above I’d want out as soon as possible, but I’m pretty sure the events leading up to the bus being in this position may have taken weeks.
I’m not suggesting that the bus crept through the hole in that amount of time. I’m suggesting that the bus driver was preoccupied with a passenger whose child was being a distraction. The passenger, let’s say it’s a single dad, distraught by the recent loss of his wife has been unable to figure out how to help his child behave and is on the way to get some help. The bus driver is at the end of his shift and is looking forward to watching the World Cup at his favorite pub, but he has to get to his last stop on time to make that happen. So, the reason the bus went forward instead of reverse took weeks not moments.
When this happens I must remind myself of a few things:
1. Patience is a piece of the fruit of the Holy Spirit. When I lack it, then I’m forgetting something.
2. I need to be patient with others lack of patience
3. I should not expect others to be patient with their brokenness, especially when the Holy Spirit is absent from their lives. If they don’t know Jesus, then why should I expect them to act like they do?
4. My schedule cannot be determined by the chaos generated in others context.
It took a while for them to find themselves homeless and my immediate response to fix their situation may actually impede my ability to minister to their need for Jesus. Ever wonder why the people Jesus healed had to wait so long for God to finally heal them? Ever wonder about those who got a quick fix from Jesus? Did their lack of misery now lead them away from God instead of toward Him? I wonder if this is what happened to nine of the lepers. While I fully agree that my presence in the world should lead to more justice, mercy, grace, and love I also must recognize that suffering is used by God. So, when one chooses to buy cigarettes and comes up short on rent money maybe the only way to learn not to do it again is point out the choice to smoke over shelter and not provide shelter…at least not immediately.
My blog is for Losers! The Conversion Investment part 3
When I was in Youth Ministry I came up with the tag line, “Making Losers More Than Conquerors.” Now depending upon how you read that phrase either the ministry was going to be about making Losers more than we make Conquerors, or the ministry was going to be about turning Losers into something more than a Conqueror. In reality, it meant both things.
The phrase is a marriage of Romans 8:37 and 2 Corinthians 12:10. It is the mysterious fusion of two opposites, conquerors and losers; strength and weakness. Life sucks, but yet it is glorious all at the same time.
It is imperative for someone to be converted to realize just how big of a Loser we are apart from Christ. We go about winning a lot of small meaningless battles without Him. We really bring Him nothing worth bragging about other than our brokenness, so that He can be glorified in putting us back together as He intended us to be while looking forward to the eventual finish of that work on the other side of death. It’s the death of Christ that makes us worthy. Without it we are worthless. It’s this admission of our Loserdom that keeps us from really being converted. It’s why time and relationship and truth and love and conflict is necessary to help people not only go from life to death, but to live in the reality of this new life.
Because it is also imperative to realize that NOTHING can separate us from the love of God shown to us through Jesus Christ in order to enjoy the converted life. Nothing can overcome His love. Even if we are led as sheep to the slaughter and it looks as if we should be pitied the reality is that our suffering can produce an immeasurable amount of joy and because of this we more than Conquer fear, failure, and death. In fact, those aren’t even battles for us to win anymore.
Weird, right?
But awesome!
So, what are your losses? Do you feel like sharing them here?
Have you found a way to rejoice in the midst of your loserdom?
“35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword?36 As it is written, For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.
37
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.38 For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers,39 nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
The Mind Wars – Pleading When Praise Will Do!
Joshua and the Battle of Jericho, what a complete misrepresentation of the actual events of a story found in Joshua 1-6. There was no battle, except for maybe an unseen one in the heads of the Israelites. After watching their ancestors disobey and wander for 40 years would they now trust that God would do what He said He would do through Moses and now Joshua?
I’m sure that they said that they believed, but in practice would they be obedient? I think God wondered the same thing, which is why He doesn’t tell them where the weak point was in the defense, nor does He give them a secret weapon. Instead God has them do something completely ridiculous. (I think Veggie Tales got this one right!) Just march around the city seven times and blow your horns. Prior to the “battle”, it is recorded, “Then the LORD said to Joshua, “See, I have delivered Jericho into your hands, along with its king and its fighting men.”
I wonder how often we refuse to hear or see the victory, the healing, the miracle, the impossible made possible because we just can’t admit we don’t believe it. It’s like a great golfer or gymnast who before attempting a difficult shot or routine fails to visualize the success. In despair we continue to plead with God when praise is required to give us new eyes and ears.
I found this little video as I began trying to de-clutter my Google Reader after a Lenten Fast from reading blogs. I find great encouragement as we wait for the opportunity to double the size of our family, and as we wait for the cancer in mom’s lungs and the rest of her to miraculously disappear.
Mom and Dad, Kristi, Shelbi, Baili, Mallori, Kamri, Lucas, Lilli this is for you. Be encouraged Our God has delivered us!